


...Therefore I Am

by AotA, aughoti



Series: Cogito ergo sum [2]
Category: Ghost in the Shell, Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Androids, Artificial Intelligence, Cyborgs, GFY, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-22
Updated: 2013-04-24
Packaged: 2017-12-09 04:48:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/770146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AotA/pseuds/AotA, https://archiveofourown.org/users/aughoti/pseuds/aughoti
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prowl is human, Jazz is... not. And Prowl thinks that it should probably be the other way around.</p><p>This fic is NOT a crossover in the strictest sense but instead fuses the two.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Prowl carefully ignored the carelessly muffled whispers and rude stares of two of his coworkers as Jazz gave a discontent growl, as though in his ear. It was something that he had gotten used to. Whispers, stares, and Jazz's inevitable snarls in response. The door shut silently behind him, blocking the both of them from sight, and Prowl let out an equally silent sigh.

"Frag it, Prowl. I just can't stand how you let those wastes of space do that, day, after day, after day... Ever since you were outed as a cyborg they just stare at you like something they'd see in a zoo. It's not right."

Prowl's eyes narrowed lightly, as though guarding themselves against the sudden glare of headlights, even though his optical input compensated immediately. Though his mouth didn't move, he replied with a dull, "It is pointless to show a reaction, or protest, Jazz."

Jazz was silent for a long moment, "I just wish... I could get them to stop, since you won't do anything."

"Not possible," Prowl replied, a tinge of something mournful in those unvoiced words.

Jazz let a long sigh wash over the both of them, "I know, I know. It still sucks though."

"I would be... pleased," Prowl replied, "if you were able to do so, though I would still request that you refrain. My statement as to the pointlessness still stands, but I would be, glad."

"Heh," Jazz let out a breath of a laugh, "Thanks, Prowl. You don't know how much that means to me."

Prowl's mouth tightened slightly. "...I'm sure I do not, Jazz." He looked up at the night sky, dark clouds and the light pollution of the city blocking out all but the brightest of stars. "I am sure I do not," he repeated out loud, voice drowned out by the wail of sirens, the splash of tires in puddles, and purr of vehicles, the clamor of the millions of voices that resided in the city.

Jazz was more human that he was, Prowl reflected as the door opened behind him and he was nearly knocked over.

Neither of them apologized and the other man simply went on his way. Prowl straightened his coat and slid his hands into his pockets. He felt the lightest of sprinkles against his cheek, but Prowl didn't care.

It was going to rain again.

It was ironic, but Prowl would be the first to admit that the AI was more human than the human who owned the "artificial" intelligence. By the same token that named Jazz as an artificial thing would never allow him to be a person by law.

After all, "Every aspect of learning or any other feature of intelligence can be so precisely described that a machine can be made to simulate it."

To the ones who believed that... Jazz was nothing more than a fancy bit of programming, whose inputs and outputs gave him a mere facsimile of life, a simulation of being.

He didn't give a damn about the Chinese room argument. To him, it was the same as the argument surrounding the existence of the human soul. Did they have one? Did they comprehend? Did they understand?

...or were they simply so much meat?

Prowl wasn't sure about either. Nor did he care. Maybe he had a soul. Maybe he didn't. Maybe Jazz didn't understand anything, and simply functioned by the order of inputs and outputs. Maybe he understood. Maybe Jazz was the one with a soul and humans were meat puppets.

Maybe...

"...Prowl? You okay?"

Prowl's lips quirked slightly, "I'm fine."

What did it matter?

Maybe they were all nothing but the dream of some higher being. How could they know?

The answer was simple: they couldn't, not beyond the tenuous strands of faith.

Prowl strolled down the street, letting Jazz stream music through his head and chatter about this and that.

When the rain began pouring down, the aloof smile on his face stayed firmly in place as he walked down the emptying streets, all the color drained from the landscape and buildings gray looming.

* * *

Jazz murmured a quiet goodnight to his owner as he settled down for sleep. Prowl was pushing it again, Jazz though unhappily. It wasn't healthy to get so little down time. For all that Prowl's body was completely artificial on down to his brain case, the man wasn't an inexhaustible machine, no matter how much he liked to pretend he was.

His coworkers, Jazz thought with disgust, took greedy advantage of Prowl's willingness to work till he was blind and further. It was sickening, but it was familiar.

Prowl expected the kind of treatment he was being faced with.

Jazz crooned a quiet melody to his owner, knowing that it relaxed him even though his conscious mind was absent.

He just had to wait a little longer and Jazz would stop their callous abuse of Prowl's abilities.

"Just a little while longer," Jazz murmured, "then I'll take care of it. I'll take care of everything." He imagined running fingers through Prowl's short white hair and wondered what it might feel like.

After a long moment, Jazz quietly withdrew and ventured out into the ënet. There were things that he had to keep a metaphorical eye on if he wanted everything to go smoothly.

He didn't want to cause trouble for Prowl, and that is what would happen if he didn't do this right.

Jazz felt a worrisome feeling at leaving Prowl without a word. He didn't want to, but it was necessary.

He would just have to make sure he got back before Prowl woke up. He wouldn't forgive himself if he was the one to cause Prowl distress, but he also couldn't afford to hurry.

It was a dilemma that he would be glad to be done with, Jazz knew.

Massive amounts of information in the form of templates, heuristics, sensory data, interpretive programming poured through him as he did the final checks. It was so close to being done, Jazz's thought form quivered with nervous anticipation but he held himself back.

Just a little longer, Jazz told himself.

Just a little longer...


	2. Chapter 2

Jazz wended his way into the brand new shell, testing it as he went, feeling the differences between what he knew was _Prowl_ and what he had designed. He had finally completed it, after a lot of indecision on what he wanted to external appearance to be before deciding that as long as it didn't fall into the realm of "uncanny valley" or "hideously ugly"—both of which he had researched very carefully _and_ surreptitiously polled the humans who felt those thing at a "gut" level that he would probably never understand—though he thought that Prowl wouldn't care one way or the other. _Jazz_ wanted to look _real_ for Prowl though, because the cyborg cared about so few things—he didn't care about this either, Jazz knew—it was the least he could do, even if Prowl didn't know.

Settling in, slaving the hardware to his consciousness via the heavily modified, faux braincase, Jazz turned on the visor he'd fashioned out of a very thin, very densely packed photoreceptive material which was then sandwiched between two layers of extremely strong, clear, _scratch resistant_ plastic and connected directly to the optical center of Jazz's brand new "brain". Jazz had had plenty of experience looking out into the physical world through Prowl's "realistically human" cyborg eyes and it wasn't exactly his preferred mode of visual input.

It had made him feel oddly claustrophobic when he closed off other senses and just looked through those two optics. Claustrophobia, if such a diagnosis could even be applied to a purely digital intelligence such as himself. It wasn't entirely surprising, because Jazz had always had eyes and cameras everywhere. He would still have those eyes, but if he got cut off from them, as it was now a real possibility, he would be essentially _blind_ , so he had slowly accustomed himself to learning to cope with the restricted viewpoint.

After spending several minutes to reorient himself, Jazz propped himself up, movements still a little jerky.

He held up the human—cyborg—hand in front of his optics—optics that he could see out of, optics that belonged to him—with a few jerky motions that he immediately devoted processor power to smoothing out, to look more natural, despite the fact that it was completely unnatural for a being that had come to life as a small bundle of recursive programming that grew and learned until _it_ was a _he_ , and _he_ named himself _Jazz_.

It was _his_ hand that he was moving. It was _his_ optics he was seeing out of.

He curled the fingers curiously, watching them as they moved to his instructions. Mocha skin stretched and creased in a way that was fascinating despite the fact that he knew every centimeter of the body he had constructed.

It was honestly amazing. Thrilling. It was a sensation of intrigue and aliveness that he wanted to share with Prowl. That sense of _being alive_ that Prowl always felt so distant from, as if he were seeing the world in shades of gray, rather than the brilliant shades Jazz knew it could be. Jazz wanted Prowl to know and share in the sheer _joy_ that Jazz felt, had felt, would continue to feel, so long as he had Prowl to talk to, to engage that amazing human mind that was genius... and _isolated_.

With that thought in mind, with the need to _move_ , he swung _his_ feet down off the table, feeling slightly giddy as they told him that the floor was _cold_ , the simple temperature differential creating sensations that were translated by the protocols that should have been translating information into an organic format into something unique and as beautiful as it was strange to an AI that had never felt its like before.

It was _his_ skin—wired with kilometers of tiny, tiny wires and sensors—that told him what his body was feeling.

He curiously moved his feet, testing the sensations curiously, bouncing his heels, tapping his toes, rolling his foot back and forth, side to side, testing commands and function and limitation. Pressing against the limits, and breaking them, was _Jazz_. It was what had made him _more_ than just another AI.

Stiff. That was Jazz's verdict. But that was okay. He could work on that. It wasn't any actual design flaw, just something that needed to be worked up to so he could reach the estimated specifications of the body he had designed. Then he would go _beyond_. Because he was Jazz, and that was what Jazz did. Was created to do.

Carefully, he set his weight down on those bare, synthskin covered feet and stood up. He turned his head, heavy braided locks of hair that were wrapped around sensitive antenna fell over his shoulder, startling him. He raised his hand and touched the black "hair" curiously for a moment before he turned his attention back to the table that he had built this body upon.

He was _standing_.

Jazz laughed—synthetic lungs expanding and contracting as an artificial diaphragm sent spasms through his frame in a way that was disorienting but _good_ —realizing that this was it, and heard his voice with his own audio receptors, his own ears for the first time.

It was a deep voice, as his voice had always been translated smoothly into Prowl's ears, but there was _more_ of it, as the sounds echoed and rebounded in the room and vibrated from his throat and came back to his ears in a way that was entirely different from the way he had listened to the world from sterile online connections and mics.

It was the sound of _life_.

And it was a music all of its own to his ears.

Jazz took his first step and his fingers touched fabric—a shirt: white, with a simple blue and red stripe running down it, cotton, soft, light—he lifted it up, looked at it with his optics, his eyes for the first time. A pair of black sweats with white athletic lines was under the shirt.

Jazz gingerly—awkwardly—maneuvered the shirt on, catching the shirt on still ungainly fingers and arms, getting it stuck on his optical visor—claustrophobia rising when the lack of sight capabilities frightening him when he couldn't seem to—and on the right way.

He balanced himself against the table as he carefully pulled on the sweats, and socks, and shoes, and finally felt quite stiffled by the unanticipated reduction in sensor readings.

Jazz ran his hands down his front, feeling the way his hands touched the shirt, and the shirt touched his hands and his chest, and his hand touched his chest through his shirt.

He dropped his hand when an alert reminded him that he needed to go.

He wouldn't let Prowl wake up without him there.

Jazz had always been there for him, and he wasn't going to let this new thing start off with the bad associations of Jazz-not-being-there for Prowl. Not when all of it had been so Jazz could do just that.

He took an awkward step, adjusted for the difference between wearing shoes and not, then he took another, and recalbrated again, and repeated the cycle over and over until he was smoothly walking through the door, hand reaching out and grabbing the wallet that held his new identity and put it in his pocket in one smooth motion.

He playfully kicked the door to the room closed and with a command to the networks that were his and his alone, he locked everything down.

Jazz grinned, white teeth flashing in the gloom as his visor glowed.

Do it with style, or don't bother doing it.

Jazz chuckled and left the place of his embodiment behind, slipping into the cab that he'd arranged to have waiting.

"Jazz, right?" the cabbie asked, peering at him from around his seat.

"That's me," Jazz said with a half smile as he carefully assumed a casual posture to set the man at ease.

"Lennox Park?" the man asked, raising a skeptical eyebrow as he eyed Jazz up and down, "Sure that's where you want to go?"

"I'm sure, man," Jazz smiled, "Go ahead."

The cabbie snorted, "It's no skin off of my nose." He started the engine up and peeled away from the curb.

Jazz leaned back.

This was it.


	3. Chapter 3

Jazz stepped out into the sun as it beat down from above, he waved the cabbie off when the man made to ask if he was _sure_ he wanted to be dropped off that this particular place.

"I'm sure, now shoo," Jazz waved him off and swaggered into the building. He swiped his wallet at the check-in sensor. "Aeson Chandrashekara," he said, "I'm here to see a friend. He won't have be expecting me."

"Name?" she asked, eyebrows creeping higher as she eyed the credentials that popped up on her screen from the tag embedded in the badge with suspicion.

"Qasim Chandra," he leaned against the counter.

She frowned, "He's not allowed visitors at this point in time."

Jazz tapped his fingers on the counter, "Check the addendum. I'm on the exceptions list."

She blinked and did so, "Oh, my apologies, sir. He's on level 6. Room 6621."

"The usual then," Jazz said with a nod, even though he had already known that, "Thank you, miss."

"Your welcome, sir," she smiled as Jazz trotted off.

He loitered around the elevator until it appeared. He stepped inside and mashed the button for the right level.

Several long moments later and people getting on and off the elevator, Jazz arrived at his floor and took the exit at a brisk walk. The Lennox Park Hospital specialized in cyberization, from fitting prosthetics to performing complete transfers, they could handle even Prowl's issues when it came to dealing with cyberbrain problems.

Jazz counted the doors, 13... 15... rounding a corner, 17... 19... 21. He stopped.

He let out a breath in a rush, wondering if that really worked on humans, before he placed his hand against the against the lock. After a moment, the scan completed without a hitch and the door unlocked and opened.

Stepping inside, he saw a familiar nurse checking in on Prowl, "Good afternoon."

The nurse, who Jazz knew to be names Christina, jumped and whirled around with a squeak and wide eyes.

Jazz raised both his hands, "Sorry for startling you, ma'am. Didn't mean to."

She clutched her pad to her chest, "Who are you? How did you get in here?" She edged herself between Jazz and Prowl protectively.

"Aeson Chandrashekara," he introduced himself, slowly lowering his hands, warmed by the display, "I've been on his," a nod to the prone Prowl, "visitation list for the past month. I heard he was in again and didn't want him to have to spend it alone. Again." Not that Prowl had ever _really_ been alone because Jazz had been with him, but most people didn't count an AI as company, even these days.

Christina stared him up and down with narrow eyes. She flicked her fingers over the pad, bringing up Prowl's file. "ID?"

Jazz pulled out his wallet again and flipped it open, displaying the badge for the first time the exact same way he had felt Prowl do the same, ID with his picture and "official" name showing next to the bar code.

"How about that?" Christina said with a soft note of surprise, stiffness easing out of her shoulders, "It's a match." She switched off the display of her pad and stood straighter, "It's about time that boy had someone here for him." She smiled, "Thank you, Mr. Chandrashekara."

"Jazz," he said with a friendly smile, "I prefer Jazz."

"Jazz, then," Christina said, "I'm all done here, so if you want to sit with him until he wakes up you are free to do so."

"Thank you," Jazz said, and pulled out the lone chair that, in all the times Prowl had been in and out of this place, Jazz didn't think anyone had ever sat in while Prowl had been a patient.

He perched on it, staring down at Prowl, hand reaching out hesitantly, hovering just the tiniest bit away from touching Prowl's face.

Slowly, he lowered his hand, threading it through the soft white hair, tracing around the curve of his skull and to the connection ports at the back of his neck. He paused in the space of another breath, before he opened the port on the side of his wrist and maneuvered the cable that extended from it to the ports with a single deft motion of his hand.

He leaned over Prowl, placing his other hand against the cyborg's cheek.

 _"Time to wake up, Prowl,"_ he called after reconnecting himself to Prowl's mind and initialized the protocols that would let him remain connected to Prowl the way he was supposed to be. He disconnected the now unnecessary cable soon afterward and started combing his fingers though light hair as he waited.

He could feel Prowl waking up slowly, the way he always did after these appointments. He smiled when he saw Prowl's eyes flutter open and a faint frown curved his lips.

 _"...Why are you choosing now to project that image now?"_ Prowl asked, and Jazz had to grin.

"Not a projection," Jazz said out loud, his grin widened as Prowl blinked at him, mind whirring away as he tried to make sense of that statement.

Jazz waited patiently, with fond amusement seeping across the connections he had reforged between them so that it was as if he hadn't left for even the little while that he had.

 _"You said that out loud,"_ Prowl said, blinking again, _"And you're... touching me?"_

Prowl's hand landed on top of Jazz's, testing, as he always did. His hand stopped. _"What on Earth?"_ He paused and then his eyes narrowed and Jazz couldn't help but be fascinated watching the subtle emotions cross Prowl's face under the overriding chill, _"What did you do?"_

Jazz chuckled. "Why are you so accusing, 'Mr. Chandra'?" He ran his thumb over Prowl's cheek, sending innocent, snuggly feelings. _"Prowl,"_ he murmured, mind to mind.

Prowl caught Jazz's hand and slowly sat up, watching Jazz, as if waiting for him to disappear. _"This isn't a projection and you aren't hijacking my sense of touch. You had to have done something,"_ Prowl reached out and touched the tips of his fingers against Jazz's cheek with a featherlight weight.

"Still here," Jazz said.

 _"How is this even possible?"_ Prowl asked faintly, "Jazz?"

At his name, finally spoken aloud, Jazz couldn't stop himself from pulling Prowl into a hug, wrapping his arms around the stiff cyborg and squeezing him in a way that was _long_ overdue. He buried his face against Prowl's neck, not even feeling the faintest tinge of claustrophobia when he felt Prowl quiver in his mental hold and under his hands.

"You can cry if you want," Jazz said, as arms slowly wrapped around him, _"I've got you."_

Prowl shuddered and rested his head against Jazz's shoulder, hot droplets wetting his shirt, silent as he almost always was, letting out soundless gasping breaths.

"Jazz..." he whispered voice catching.

"I've got you, and I'm here and I'm not going _anywhere_ ," Jazz murmured fiercely, the embrace more than just physical, the promise more than just words.

"You're here," Prowl breathed, _"You're still here."_

"Yes," Jazz replied, _"Always."_

 _"You did this for me, didn't you?"_ Prowl asked, questions bubbling up from his mind.

 _"Anything for you,"_ Jazz said.

_"Why?"_

_"I wanted to."_

Because Jazz wanted to be a solid presence for Prowl to lean on as much as he was there as a mental one. Because he wanted to be there and share the beauty he could see in life with Prowl. Because he wanted to show that _Prowl_ was more than others though when they looked at him.

Because against all probability, against all logic, that feeling that he, an AI, felt for Prowl could only be love.

Prowl gasped when Jazz let that feeling seep through as his true answer, pulling back, tears still dampening his cheeks, but his eyes were bright. _"...Jazz?"_

 _"Smile for me?"_ Jazz loosened his grip, but didn't let go.

Prowl smiled wobbily, so obviously unused to the motion, despite everything Jazz had wanted for him.

Jazz smiled gently back, and Prowl's smile caught fire, coming to life, like the perfect sunrise turning everything it touched a shining molten gold.

He thought he just might understand the meaning of "breathtaking" now.

* * *

An extra from the awesome [aughoti](http://aughoti.dreamwidth.org/) who saw my characters truly, and wrote a perfect little scene where Jazz tries to persuade Prowl to play hooky with him.

* * *

Call in sick."

"They know I'm a cyborg, Jazz. That would make no sense."

"Emergency maintenance?"

How someone with a visor rather than eyes could pull off the "forlorn puppy" look, Prowl wasn't sure. He shook his head.

"Mental health day, so you don't snap and kill them all on their coffee break?"

Jazz was rewarded with an unwilling huff of laughter from Prowl. "That sounds a lot more like you than me."

A slash of white that might be a smile. "That's why you need me!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last part of TIA. I will admit that you can keep an eye out for the prequel oneshot though. Beyond that, I have no more plans for such obviously GitS!verse TFs. *pause* Frag. Never mind. Sudden bunny attack. _Shoo!_ Stupid bunnies.


End file.
